Sustainable Tourism Law

THE UNWTO DRAFT CONVENTION ON THE PROTECTION OF TOURISTS 213 resulting from the combination of at least two different types of tourist services included in the same trip or holiday when the package lasts longer than 24 hours, or at least an overnight stay, and also when other requirements from Art. 1, Standard 1.1 occur 34 . Basically, the travel package contract discipline deals with a subject, who is him/herself a contractor or in any case the beneficiary of a service included into the travel package, but he/she might not be necessarily the person who travels in the same way as indicated by the qualifying requirements of Art. 3, lett. b , of the General provisions. Likewise, the accommodation that the “service provider” provides to the “tourist” – to be noticed here is the fact that the term “guest” is not mentioned, instead the contract counterpart is usually identified as “hotel-keeper” – is simply indicated as the provision of accommodation to a tourist who does not decide to stay there permanently, upon payment or based on a contract 35 . Furthermore, among subjects involved with the International Convention identified by Art. 3 of General provisions, the “ Tourism service provider ” 36 plays a relevant key role together with the “ Accommodation service provider ” 37 , being 34 The identification of the case is completed, in fact, by the condition that “(i) Those tourism services are combined by one trader, including at the request of or in accordance with the selection of the tourist, before a single contract on all services is concluded; or (ii) Irrespective of whether separate contracts are concluded with individual tourism service providers, those services are: a . Purchased from a single point of sale and those services have been selected before the tourist agrees to pay, b . Offered, sold or charged at an inclusive or total price, c . Advertised or sold under the term ‘package’ or under a similar term, or d . Combined after the conclusion of a contract by which a trader entitles the tourist to choose among a selection of different types of tourism services. A combination of tourism services where not more than one type of tourism service as referred to in point (i), (ii) or (iii) of the definition of tourism service is combined with one or more travel services as referred to in point (iv) of that definition is not a package if the latter services: (i) do not account for a significant proportion of the value of the combination and are not advertised as and do not otherwise represent an essential feature of the combination; or (ii) are selected and purchased only after the performance of a tourism service as referred to in point (i), (ii) or (iii) of the definition of tourism service has started. (e)“Tourism service” means: (i) Passenger transport; (ii) Accommodation which is not intrinsically part of the passenger transport and is not for residential purposes; (iii) Rental of cars or other motor vehicles; and (iv) Other tourism services that are not intrinsically part of the tourism service within the meaning of points (i), (ii) or (iii) of this definition” (Art. 1, Standard 1.1, Annex II – Package travel ). 35 See Art. 1, Standard 1.1, lett. a , Annex III – Accommodation , according to which “ Accommodation service ” means the provision of accommodation to the tourist who does not take up long term residence, against remuneration or in a contractual framework”. 36 Under Art. 3, lett. c , of the General provisions , “ Tourism service provider ” means any natural person or any legal person (irrespective of whether privately or publicly owned) who sells, offers to sell, supplies or undertakes to supply a tourism service to the tourist”. 37 According to the definition of Art. 1, lett. i, Annex III – Accommodation , “ Accommodation service provider ” means the tourism service provider who, directly or through an intermediary, sells offers to sell, supplies or undertakes to supply standalone accommodation services. For the purpose of Articles 2, 3 and 5 of this Annex, intermediaries facilitating the provision of standalone accommodation services are considered accommodation services providers”.